Chapter 36
God or the gods: existence, nature, attributes, worship and relation to the world and to man.
2128 passages · 878 principal · Covers the 49 volumes of primary texts
The idea of God, or of the gods, covers more than any other in these volumes. It takes in the question whether there is a God and how that could be known, what he is like, how many gods there are, how he made and governs the world, why he permits evil, and how men are to stand toward him in obedience, trust and worship. It is a great idea for the Harvard Classics because almost every author in them has to settle accounts with it. The Hebrew psalmist, Homer’s Ithacans, the Stoic slave and the Stoic emperor, Augustine, the Koran, the Bhagavad-Gita, Pascal, Hume, Darwin and Emerson all take it up. Some argue for God, some confess him, some complain against him, and some doubt that the question still matters.
The arguments for God’s existence move along two main roads. The first runs from causes and ideas. Hobbes holds that tracing causes back to a first mover yields belief in one eternal God, whereas fear breeds many gods1. Descartes argues that his idea of a more perfect Being could not have come from himself2. He adds that existence belongs to the idea of a Perfect Being as surely as equal angles belong to a triangle3. Pascal reasons from the contingency of the thinking self to a necessary Being4. Berkeley claims a direct demonstration: sensible things must be perceived by an infinite Mind5. The second road runs from order. Epictetus finds that the harmony of the universe implies an Administrator rather than chance6. Penn sees the Maker’s wisdom and goodness stamped on creation7. Rousseau’s vicar argues that blind matter could not produce thinking beings8, yet he confesses that he cannot comprehend the essence of the Being he infers9. Bacon would rather believe every legend than that the frame of the universe is without a mind10.
Criticism of these proofs comes from two very different quarters. Hume grants the design argument for the sake of discussion and then confines it. The authors of the universe may be credited only with the power, intelligence and benevolence visible in their work11. A unique cause known only through its productions permits only attributes exactly proportioned to its effects12. To ascribe perfections beyond these is flattery, not philosophy13. Pascal attacks from the side of faith. Nature shows too much to deny God and too little to be sure of him14. Proving God from nature to unbelievers is futile15, and metaphysical proofs are remote and breed pride16. Darwin, more quietly, puts the Creator’s purposes beyond the reach of science17 and doubts that talk of a plan of creation adds anything to knowledge18. Atheism itself is treated less as a position than as a folly or a symptom. The psalmist’s fool says there is no God19. Bacon thinks atheism lies more on the lip than in the heart20, and Hume finds hardly anyone who is a true speculative atheist21. Rousseau argues instead from consequences: without God the wicked man reasons rightly and the good man is a fool22. Carlyle records the modern experience of a Divinity withdrawn, replaced by an iron circle of Necessity23.
Nearly all the authors agree that God exceeds understanding, though they draw different lessons from this. Job calls him higher than heaven and deeper than Sheol24, and the Preacher says his work is beyond finding out25. Browne holds that God alone truly is and that no creature can comprehend him26. Hobbes turns incomprehensibility into a rule of speech: those who reason to one infinite God honour him rather than define him27. Pascal concludes that we may know that God is without knowing what he is28,29. Yet the creatures speak. Augustine questions creation and hears it answer that it is not God but was made by him30. The Koran calls the heavens and earth signs that bid men remember God31. Pascal locates the decisive knowledge in the heart: faith is God felt by the heart, not by reason32. From this he builds his doctrine of the hidden God, who sets signs visible only to wholehearted seekers33 and is neither manifestly evident nor wholly concealed34. Tennyson finds the Maker’s drift dark, an Isis veiled, and still trusts him35. Lessing gives revelation a history. God educated the Hebrews by degrees toward the idea of the One36, until in captivity they recognized Jehovah as God rather than a national deity37.
The same authors warn against unworthy conceptions of God. Plutarch faults the poets for portraying gods full of enmity and passion38. Hobbes describes men feigning innumerable gods from their own fancy39 and shaping them with human passions and vices40. Emerson observes that men’s gods mirror themselves, whether cannibal, crusader or merchant41. Bacon would rather men had no opinion of God than an unworthy one42. Augustine records the same struggle from within: long after he knew God to be incorruptible, he still pictured him as extended in space43.
When the authors describe God’s nature, a remarkably common vocabulary appears. Augustine insists that God’s substance is unchangeable44 and that God is wholly everywhere yet nowhere in space45. The Koran names him the Living, the Self-subsistent46. Dante sees the eternal Light alone self-dwelling and self-understood47, and Milton’s Adam learns that God is alone from eternity and needs no companion48. A related doctrine identifies God’s power with his will. Augustine holds that God’s will and power are one and cannot be constrained49. Browne finds all things equally easy to God50, and Rousseau’s vicar affirms the identity of power and will in God51. Pascal records the limiting rule that God can do everything except what would make him not almighty, such as lying or dying52. Raleigh insists that God is free in choosing his times, not bound by necessity as fire is to burn53. Berkeley argues that God knows pain but cannot suffer it, since suffering is an imperfection54. Omniscience is sung in the psalm that finds no flight from God’s presence55. Epictetus says the same in a Stoic register: God stands by every deed and prayer56.
On God’s moral attributes, the psalms and the Koran alike join mercy to judgment. God is slow to anger and forgiving57, merciful and ruler of the day of judgment58. Blake names God Mercy, Pity, Peace and Love in human form59. Justice and vengeance are just as old. Aeschylus’ Zeus avenges outraged hospitality, though he tarries60, and Raleigh’s God judges the mighty and the private alike61. Burke completes the portrait by arguing that the idea of the Deity is inseparable from awe and terror62, the note sounded when the Lord answers Job from the whirlwind63.
The unity of God is asserted against idols and rival gods. Jehovah is the great King above all gods64. Paul declares idols nothing, with one God the Father and one Lord Jesus Christ65. Christian doctrine then complicates this unity. Augustine holds the Son co-eternal and of one substance with the Father66, and Dante professes one God in three Persons67. Lessing, philosophizing, argues that God’s perfect self-conception must be real, so that the Son is begotten from eternity68. The Koran answers with unyielding oneness: God neither begets nor is begotten69, and the Trinity and the divinity of the Messiah are rejected70. Polytheism, meanwhile, is studied historically. Herodotus traces the names of the Greek gods to Egypt71 and credits Homer and Hesiod with the Greek theogony72. Milton imagines the pagan gods fleeing at the Nativity73.
On creation, Raleigh holds that God makes out of nothing and is no artificer working pre-given matter74. The Koran’s God says “Be” and it is75. The question that divides moderns is how God goes on acting in the world he made. Descartes equates God’s sustaining action with creation and allows that the world could have arisen from chaos by laws76. Pascal cannot forgive him for using God merely to set the world in motion77. Browne’s God, by contrast, sustains every essence through his concourse78. Hume judges that occasionalism, which makes God the immediate cause of everything, diminishes his grandeur79. Rousseau holds God best displayed by nature’s fixed order rather than by miracles80. Darwin pushes the point furthest. Independent creation would make God’s works a deception81, and it accords better with what we know of the Creator that he impressed laws on matter and worked through secondary causes82. He cites a divine who thought this view equally noble83.
Whether God is in the world as well as over it is the next question. Marcus Aurelius says one god pervades all things84, and Long explains the Stoic view as God united to the world as soul to body, yet not identical with it85. Pope calls nature God’s body86, while Raleigh warns that confusing God with Nature is impiety87. Wordsworth feels a presence interfused through sunsets and the mind of man88. Epictetus makes man a fragment of God89. Emerson radicalizes the thought: there is no wall between the soul and God90, and the law within us is God91. The Gita’s Lord dwells in all things and all things in him92. Yet he also abides outside them93, and he reveals a cosmic form without beginning, middle or end94.
Providence is affirmed across every period. Epictetus’ Disposer orders summer and winter, vice and virtue, for the harmony of the whole95. Marcus thinks a deity without forethought hard to imagine96. Luke’s God numbers hairs and remembers sparrows97. Seamen and warriors credit him with particular deliverances. Drake trusts a providence that never fails those who trust it98, and Beowulf credits the true God with his victory99. Over nations, Luther says God tosses kingdoms about at will100. Lincoln, seeing both sides pray to the same God, concludes that the Almighty has his own purposes101. Affliction is read as discipline: Woolman’s God afflicts not without purpose102, and Pascal makes providence the sole true cause of what we call evils103. On human agency, Machiavelli holds that God does not do everything, so as to leave room for free will104. Pope denies that God suspends his general laws for favourites105.
The problem of evil sets the vindicators against the accusers. Milton’s poem aims to justify the ways of God to men106. Pope teaches that partial evil is universal good107, and Rousseau holds that omnipotent goodness cannot will evil108. On the other side, Job accuses God of tearing him like an adversary109, yet he trusts that his Redeemer lives110. Gloucester says the gods kill us as wanton boys kill flies, for their sport111. Mill’s father could not believe a world so full of evil was made by infinite power and perfect goodness112. Mill himself judges a God who makes Hell to be the perfection of wickedness113. Tennyson’s gods smile beside their nectar at human pain114, and Blake asks whether he who made the lamb made the tiger115.
On God and sin, Hume presses the case that if necessity holds, the Creator authors human crimes116. He then calls the reconciliation a mystery exceeding reason117. Pascal answers that God tempts by affording occasions but does not lead into error118. Rousseau rejects a vindictive, partial God in favour of a merciful common father119. FitzGerald’s clay pots debate whether the Potter would break what he made120.
Man’s relation to God is pictured through several images. God is father: Epictetus calls him Maker, Father and Kinsman of men121, and Channing calls the idea of God as Father of our spirits the grandest idea122. God is owner: Socrates says we are the gods’ possession and may not free ourselves123, Job blesses the Lord who gives and takes away124, and Penn calls us tenants at will125. Bagehot objects that mere power of creation gives no moral claim to obedience126. God is guide and end. Epictetus would will what God wills127. Augustine’s heart is restless until it rests in God128, and Pascal holds that only an infinite object can fill the abyss of desire129. Socrates obeys God rather than the Athenians130.
Worship, finally, is turned inward. God needs no sacrifice131 and dwells not in temples made with hands132. Marcus says the gods want not flattery but likeness133. Franklin thinks God is best served by doing good to man134. Leigh Hunt’s Ben Adhem is accepted for loving his fellows135. Epictetus calls the reasoning being to sing hymns for all creatures136. Marcus defends prayer, since denying divine care would make it pointless137. Emerson redefines prayer as the spirit pronouncing God’s works good138. Against all this stand the tragic gods who demand honour and punish its neglect. Aphrodite declares that the gods hunger for praise139, and Dionysus destroys the Thebans who failed to recognize him140.
The epic gods help, persecute and submit by turns. Athene is Odysseus’ constant guardian141, while Poseidon raises storms against him142. Virgil asks whether heavenly minds can harbour such spite143. Above them stands Zeus, whose purpose no god may override144. Yet even Jove can grant Turnus only a reprieve, not a change of fate145. Plutarch rationalizes divine aid as the prompting of thoughts rather than the moving of bodies146.
Several questions remain open across this long conversation. One is whether reason reaches God at all, or only the heart. Another is whether God governs by general laws or by particular acts. A third is whether his goodness resembles ours, which Mill insists it must147, and whether he stands apart from the world or is its very life. The authors leave each of these questions unsettled.
Introductory essay written by Claude Opus 5.5 from the outline and the notes on every passage below; quotations are checked against this edition.
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